By BPF Online Abuse and Gender-Based Violence Against Women

The 2015 IGF Best Practice Forum (BPF) on Online Abuse and Gender-Based Violence Against Women was both timely and instructive considering the increasing effort by different stakeholders at national and global levels to understand and address the problem of online abuse and gender-based violence against women. It has showed that there are no one-size-fits all solutions, and that greater study is needed to further investigate the range of acts, underlying causes, diversity and scope of impact, and potential responses that can be developed for the issue.

The BPF used an open and inclusive process to gather a broad variety of views and inputs on this multidimensional problem over nine months. As a result of this community-driven process, the BPF’s draft findings reflect a rich diversity of responses from various stakeholders and regions regarding the issue.

The draft findings and recommendations were discussed on November 11 - at the 2015 Internet Governance Forum in Brazil - in an interactive panel that also addressed the ways in which the problem of online abuse and gender-based violence can continue to be addressed at both the IGF as a critical platform for multistakeholder engagement on key internet policy, governance and human rights issues, and in other policy discussion spaces.